apps vs. internet

having spent the last few months guzzling delicious mobile application koolaid, i'm taking a step back for a reality check...

let's recap:

the days of app developers commanding $150k per app are over. dead. toast. done. indeed, even quality developers are becoming more or less commonplace (and the vast number of amateurs may best be counted by the number of bodily function apps available at the app store).

moreover, where a mere six months ago they were a rarity, the number of app-building toolkit companies - whether chasing realtors and restauranters (swebapps, kanchoo, appbreeder), or targeting verticals like gaming (gamesalad) or music (mobileroadie) - are exploding.

and meanwhile, we're just beginning to see the i-app model replayed in the 'droid space, without perhaps the hooplah, but with some potentially greater scale. or then again, maybe not - after all, biggest threat to android is fragmentation.

blackberry? yeah, let's see. frankly, i'm not holding my breath - incidentally, i'd buy 'em if i were a certain vender that can't seem to shoot straight (or at all) in the u.s. market. palm: sort of off to a whimpering start, but i believe there remains promise in webOS. motorola? gonna be fun to watch as they throw it all behind android. and nokia? well, not in the u.s. at least not any time soon. and not based on symbian solution. there is hope though for maemo.

but anyway, back to the point, apps vs. internet: here we are, finally poised on the cusp of the internet-mobility convergence/collision/co-whatever and we've got a handful of inherently incompatible mobile operating systems extending the fenced patio mobile app model that's emerged of late as the successor to the 1990's walled gardens (much, i am sure, to the pleasure of the mobile operators who still haven't quite figured out how they're gonna survive this sh*tstorm of co-whatever).

remember wap? that was supposed to help us avoid all of this interoperability crap. shame of it was, while well-intended, the wap vision was 10 years early, predating capable devices and networks, as well as usable or otherwise valuable services and content. remember dot.mobi? same idea. same good intent - usher consumers gently, easily, comfortably into the newest extension to our most recent medium - mobility and the internet. well-inspired but ill-executed. well, kinda...

then along comes apple with an actual well-thought out plan, married to sexy hardware, and a user experience and development environment that are simple (the latter only if you happen to be a developer kinda person). and the rest has been history - everyone running around trying to replicate the experience, even blackberry, which seems rightly worried that the cow it's been milking for nearly a decade might be going dry...

and yet, somewhere along the way, slowly, quietly, the original wap and dot.mobi visions might yet be realized. they do, to some extent, overcome interoperability issues. yes, the risk is a lower common denominator service and/or content experience - but sh*t, it works across networks, across devices, across mobile operating systems. and, oh yeah, you can actually deliver dynamic content and services in a fluid manner unlike stand alone apps that rely on updating html, xml or rss feeds to update content. hey, wait, does't that sound familiar? yeah, same thing actually...

ok, so, it won't be that simple. but i think that the app developers and the microsite developers are coming to loggerheads, particularly in the marketing space, and particularly as devices become more common in terms of large screens, touch screens, etc.

and ya know what, there's something more democratic about the web-based approach. indeed, notwithstanding the sudden plethora of app-making tool companies with business plans built around bleeding you lightly while hawking the data your app collects, i'm beginning to wonder if we might instead see increasing consumer interest in designing microsites to celebrate and communicate their individual passions, lives, businesses.

imagine libraries of mobile microsites, catalogued by friends, passions or interests, each designed specifically for consumption on-the-go, always current - the digital snacking that we've all become so accustomed to as we wait in line, sit on a train, or just fiddle about - with a social twist. and, there are lots of simple web-based tools out there for mobile site creation, and, well, a lot of them free - check out mobisitegalore for instance. indeed, take it a step further and point your iphone 3G (i did kinda optimize for that device, but should work on pretty much any smartphone that's not been operator-crippled) at www.who.param.mobi and see what a half-hour's tinkering can produce around a band i happen to really enjoy).

all things considered, there's room for multiple approaches, for awhile anyway. or hell, maybe we'll all just facebook and tweet ourselves to death...

later...

Sixteen years, two months ago...

Following Excerpted from "Flashbacks: Marching Towards Midlife" - a work in progress...

July 1993

I was sitting in my hotel room catching up on whatever work needed doing when I got a call from my father-in-law. “Don’t be alarmed, don’t be upset, Peyton’s been run over by a car.”

Holy shit.

Turns out Megan had been shopping with the kids – Morgan (5), Brennan (3) and Peyton (10 months) -- and after an interminable wait behind an elderly and seemingly-medicated shopper at the checkout, she headed across the parking lot with Peyton in her arms and the other kids in tow. She noticed a car steering toward them and, through the windshield she saw, yes, that same elderly shopper. Sadly, the driver, for whatever reason, didn’t seem to notice Megan or the kids and plowed right into them. The car glanced off Morgan and bumped Megan, who, as she was going down to the pavement, lost hold of Peyton. Two thousand-plus pounds of automobile then ran over the baby right before Megan’s eyes (quite literally – she was prone on the pavement inches from the car).

The driver then meandered her car off through the parking lot before being chased down by, well, shit, quite-naturally-horrified onlookers. Megan and Peyton – tire marks across the latter's shirt and forehead – were quickly whisked away in an ambulance to nearby Potomac Elementary school where a helicopter landed to meet them. The older kids were left with a spinster pair who offered to bring them to their Grandma’s house, about a mile away. The helicopter took Peyton to Children’s, leaving a distraught Megan to rush to her parent’s place where, bursting in, she told them Peyton had been run over and might be dead. Mayhem ensued. And, in short order, all were knocked for a yet wilder loop when they realized that Morgan and Brennan hadn’t shown up yet. As it turns out ,they were quickly recovered back at the Safeway with the kind-hearted pair who, it turns out, for whatever reason, hadn’t yet budged.

Meanwhile, while all of this was happening, I was off playing trade negotiator in Switzerland, making the world safe for some or another sort of commerce or something or other.

By the time I got stateside – less than a day later and ever-so-ever-so-slightly keyed up – Peyton had been looked at, prodded, scoped and poked by the good folks at Children’s and dubbed “miracle baby” by the local media. Amazingly, other than a swollen and scratched forehead, bruised lungs and chest, and a slightly scraped and purplish foot, she was fine. Stunning. Truly. Thankfully.

As for the pharmaceutically enhanced near-octogenarian driver, she was dealt a meaningless fine for “failing to avoid colliding with a pedestrian” (or some such blather) and assessed a few points on her license (can I hear a resounding “what?”). Sixteen years since passed, I can only assume - and hope, and pray - that she’s no longer on the road.